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Chris thinking of you Best Patrick (the old fogey) -----Original Message----- From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Douglas Barbour Sent: 07 February 2010 16:49 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Bush Slam poem Chris This is sad, as Max says, & Australia isnt the only place such ignorance rules in healthcare. But I'm sure Im not alone in saying we want you to fight, & stay. And wish you the best in doing so.... Doug On 6-Feb-10, at 9:45 PM, Chris Jones wrote: > On Sat, 2010-02-06 at 19:11 +1100, Alison Croggon wrote: >> Max, I have a real prejudice against centred poetry. At least, I can >> think of one time when I used it; and I think it looks amateurish. > > This is what I felt also about some of that bush slam stuff. When I > was > caring for my mother before she passed away one of the garden club > members use to visit and read her the latest poem she had written. I > went to my computer and hid out of sight but she made sure she read > loudly enough that I could here. > > After that, I have become much softer and much more tolerant of > amateur > poets. Although I try to hide as much as I can that I am an > internationally published poet and artist, wanting more to be unknown, > the bush telegraph says otherwise. The very fact that people value > poetry enough to take it up as a hobby... what does this say? This > woman > did not want my approval. All she wanted to say was that she valued > poetry and life. And it gave my mother some reprieve from her last > crippling wheel chair bound painful months. And at the end all I could > do was hold her hand while a distressed painful voice from somewhere > else pleaded; help me, help me, help me. Her kidneys had shut down. > Her > pad was dry. The Australian health bureaucracy made sure my mother > could > not have access to morphine when she needed it most. What a cruel and > awful world we live in. And some still think computers and digital is > progress! > > So, after this, I guess I need to rethink. My doctor is on holidays. I > have run out of opiate pain relief because some dead brain ignorant > replacement doctor thinks I don't need it! I want to kill myself. > Douglas Barbour [log in to unmask] http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/ Latest books: Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy) http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664 Wednesdays' http://abovegroundpress.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-from-aboveground-press_10.h tml Swept snow, Li Po, by dawn's 40-watt moon to the road that hies to office away from home. Lorine Niedecker No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 8.5.435 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/2673 - Release Date: 02/07/10 07:22:00